Regional Oral History Office University of California the Bancroft Library Berkeley, California
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Regional Oral History Office University of California The Bancroft Library Berkeley, California Robert H. Bragg AN ORAL HISTORY WITH ROBERT H. BRAGG Interviews conducted by Nadine Wilmot in 2002 Copyright © 2005 by The Regents of the University of California Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well-placed witnesses to major events in the development of northern California, the West, and the nation. Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through tape-recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. The tape recording is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The corrected manuscript is indexed, bound with photographs and illustrative materials, and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and in other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ************************************ All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between The Regents of the University of California and Robert H. Bragg, dated June 18, 2002. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, Mail Code 6000, University of California, Berkeley 94720-6000, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Robert H. Bragg, “An Oral History with Robert H. Bragg,” an oral history conducted in 2002 by Nadine Wilmot, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, Year finished. Copy no. ______ Robert Bragg, c. 1978-81, photo courtesy of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory ROBERT H. BRAGG Discursive Table of Contents INTERVIEW DESCRIPTION ..................................................................................................................i Session 1, June 20, 20021.........................................................................................................................1 [122 minutes, minidisc 1] Family background and early years in Florida and Tennessee, early education. Interview 2, June 25, 2002......................................................................................................................27 [148 minutes, minidisc 2] Mother’s work as seamstress—family education—race consciousness in the South in Bragg’s community—journey to Chicago where he lives with his aunt and uncle—Tilden Technical High School—employment after school and lessons learned at the tea house—social environment in high school, involvement with NAACP and Communist intelligentsia—urban geography—movie theatres in Chicago—preparing for college. Interview 3, June 27, 2002......................................................................................................................59 [131 minutes, minidisc 3] Trip to Brazil—community college, student demographics, experiences with different instructors, “white folks that praise you,” cheating on the Teacher’s College entrance test, working while in school, social life—going into the military, military placement tests, segregation and racial discrimination in the military, fighting segregated showers in the military, becoming a second lieutenant in Japan, first active duty assignment as a private first class in an aviation squadron at Seymour Field in North Carolina, engineering his escape. Interview 4, July 1, 2002 ........................................................................................................................89 [155 minutes, minidisc 4 and minidisc 5, track 1. **Some tracks are out of order, marked in transcript.] His brother’s work in New Haven as a machinist—assigned to a special unit in Kingston Rhode Island, social life in wartime—special army training programs discontinued, army planning and operation, 99th Pursuit Squadron at Tuskegee—being assigned to the Quartermaster Corps, traveling from Camp Lee in Virginia to California, to the Southwest Pacific, army culture and social life—with the Quartermaster Corps in New Guinea, the Philippines—challenging Jim Crow shower, becoming second lieutenant—duties and experiences a second lieutenant, Jim Crow “cat house” in Sasebo in Japan—occupation, interactions with Japanese and Filipino civilians across racial, ethnic, and class lines—how the military personnel and officers organized themselves along race and class lines— discussion of rank and career trajectories in the army, applying to guided missile school and encountering discrimination. Interview 5, July 3, 2002 ......................................................................................................................123 [154 minutes, minidisc 5, tracks 2-16 and minidisc 6, track 1] Social consciousness, arts and culture in Chicago in the 1930s and ‘40s, Margaret Burroughs, artists and writers salons, politics and arts social circle—awareness of racial violence while growing up in the South and in Chicago, with reference to Without Sanctuary—brief discussion of art in his house including a painting by Mary Lovelace O’Neal—brief discussion of his post as Faculty Assistant for Affirmative Action under Chancellor Michael Heyman—return to discussion of World War II military service, involvement in disciplinary cases for soldiers who harmed Japanese civilians—leaving the military and going home--returning to college at Illinois Institute of Technology on the GI Bill, choosing a physics major, connections with mentors, faculty, and other students as an undergraduate, how the mechanisms that exist now to support minority students did not exist—getting married to Violet—graduating, job market for African Americans with physics degrees in 1949, requesting aid from The Urban League—taking a civil service job with the United States Post Office—returning to graduate school—quick question about the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima— master’s thesis in quantum mechanical scattering theories—after obtaining his master’s, interviewing with General Electric, and being denied security clearance due to his participation in the United Negro and Allied Veterans of America (“subversive activity”)—as a consequence, taking a job at Dover Electroplating Company, and “passing” for being not college educated, being injured while on the job. Interview 6, July 9, 2002 ......................................................................................................................153 [147 minutes, minidisc 6, tracks 2-16 and minidisc 7, track 1] Continuing with Dover Electroplating Company, being promoted and then demoted when he “comes clean”—returning to work at the post office while looking for work in his field—going to work for the Portland Cement Association Research Laboratory, learning about the Jim Crow cafeteria in his interview--the work of the association and the laboratory, hydration reactions of cement, Bulletin Twenty-Two, measuring internal surface area of cement, Brunauer Emmett Teller Theory (BET Theory), working with L.E. Copeland measuring the vapor pressure of water over dry ice acetone as a function of the water composition, working with Steven Brunauer, building from P.P. Debye’s work studying the internal structure of plastics, becoming the labs expert on x-ray crystallography and x-ray diffraction—the revelation: “layered structures,”--in conjunction with a souring professional relationship with Copeland, and internal politics at PCA—interviewing for another job with Visking Corporation, National Semiconductor, thoughtful advice for underpaid professionals—changes in family life—going to work for the Armor Research Foundation [ARF], hired by Leonid Azaroff, his professor—family life, “keeping up with the Joneses’” social circle and connections, living in Glencoe, Illinois—ethnic composition and stratification of PCA workforce, atmosphere at PCA. Interview 7, July 11, 2002 ....................................................................................................................181 [140 minutes, minidisc 7, tracks 2-17] Thoughts on accomplishments at PCA, history of x-ray diffraction and Bragg’s Law, going to Brooklyn Polytechnic to learn about x-ray diffraction—commercial context for the use of x-ray diffraction beyond PCA, application of the method across industries—going to work at ARF, with Leonid Azaroff, analyzing the defect structure of germanium—ARF industry sponsors and contracts, implications for the directions that research took, industry connections and counterparts—other African Americans at ARF and in the field, getting assistance from colleagues—rewriting and submitting